Chapter 366: A Small Incident
"Waahhh!!" Kali wails while I stand there, frantic, with no idea what to do. Her gums are bleeding because she scraped the soft flesh against the fold of the chain. I never imagined it would hurt her mouth, so I never tried to stop her from biting the chains.
"S-Shhh, baby girl! C-Calm down! I-It's okay." I rock her, but she keeps crying while I have no clue what to do. She won't let me look at her mouth properly so I can bandage it or something.
"..." All I do is run a cloth over her lips, anxiously wiping, while my hands tremble.
'Saluvia and Esther aren't around right now... wh-what do I do...' I just keep rocking her, not really understanding what I should or could do to help her.
Every second that passes with her crying only makes me more nervous. My army started fighting against the army of the angels, which meant Esther was tied up with castle paperwork for the day.
So I can't call her to help me. Saluvia, on the other hand, is apparently busy running experiments with my blood, milk, and saliva to make who-knows-what with that data.
"Hick... gwaahhh!!" Kali screams, howling, and seeing her blood gives me chills and so much discomfort. It's strangely unsettling. For someone who's had to dismember bodies, blood shouldn't faze me, right?
But seeing Kali's little mouth bleeding while I don't know what to do makes me so nervous. Is this maternal instinct? Since I only feel this way because she's the one who's hurt.
'And wh-what if she chokes? Should I stuff a cloth in her mouth to stop the bleeding and absorb the spit and blood so she doesn't choke?' I have no idea, but I end up grabbing a clean little handkerchief and sticking it in Kali's mouth.
She keeps crying and trying to scream while the handkerchief gets dirty with her blood, but I hold it in her mouth to try and help.
"Calm down, baby girl! I-I'm right here! No need to cry..." She flails her arms, kicking her little feet while she screams.
'Damn it! The one day neither of them is around, Kali gets hurt.' She had tried to bite the chains several times before and nothing ever happened, so I thought it was fine.
I didn't think she'd get hurt just nibbling on the chain, trying to gnaw on it! In the end, she's still a baby, and now that I know that, I'll be more protective and careful about what she tries to bite.
"..." She whimpers, sniffling as she drools on the cloth, her tears falling nonstop.
'I-Isn't that a lot of blood?' I notice the handkerchief turning red and I don't know if that's a lot of blood or not for a baby.
"..." I take a deep breath, deciding to use the passive [Nymph's Seduction] to manage to calm Kali down. It's the only skill I have that I can think might work to make her let me see her mouth.
Nymph's Seduction (Description = A passive ability of every nymph, which converts the Hikishin released from the body into a faint magical wave that affects your voice, appearance, and actions in the eyes of observers, able to passively affect another's mind by applying a "suggestion" to the target's mind so they accept what they are seeing, hearing, or perceiving about you)
"..." I take a deep breath, channeling the released Hikishin mainly into my voice so my words have a special touch.
"Shhh, calm down, baby girl. Let Mommy see your gums. Please stop crying so I can help you." I speak with the best calming voice I can muster. Kali, still crying, looks at me, and I think it's working.
"That's it, stop crying, sweet golden girl. Mommy's here to help you. Open your mouth so Mommy can take a look." Kali is still crying, but she stops trying to scream into the cloth.
"I'm going to take the cloth out. Please stay very still so Mommy can take a look." I generally avoided using Hikishin in my voice to apply "seduction" to others, but it's actually much more useful than just seducing.
"..." Kali stays quiet as I remove the blood-soaked cloth, but once it's out, my whole body shivers. She keeps her little mouth open, and I see it's a more serious cut than I expected.
'W-Why is it so big?' Her gum suffered a gash that, at least to my eyes, looks large. Maybe it's just my motherly desperation or the fact that Kali is small making the wound seem bigger, but I can't quite think straight.
'Was it just from the chain?' Now I feel bad and guilty for letting her keep trying to bite the chains that bind my ankle. She must have hurt herself like this while gnawing, and the edge of the connection between one chain and another must have scraped hard against her gum.
'Wait, what if she'd choked on the cloth?' I freeze, realizing she could have choked on the cloth, and maybe putting the cloth in her mouth was more dangerous than just leaving it as it was.
'A-At least it seems to have stopped bleeding heavily...' I manipulate Hikishin to make a kind of cold gel. Gently, I run two fingers over her gum. Kali shudders and waves her little hands, whimpering as if she wants me to stop.
'It's just a cold gel... I wonder if it helps?' I don't know how to manufacture medicine. Maybe by manipulating materials I could generate a remedy, but I don't know how a medicine works in order to create one. I'll have to wait for Saluvia to come back.
'...' Kali stops making loud noises, but now that the situation has calmed down a bit, seeing all this blood makes me think of Esther.
'...Blood...' A hybrid Ghoul like Esther or Kali needs to taste blood before developing an appetite for it. Esther spent 18 years without any need to eat flesh and blood.
But after she tried it, she could never feel satisfied again. Does Kali tasting her own blood count? Or for Ghoul instincts, would it have to be the blood of another living being?
'No! Probably not... Esther literally went 18 years without awakening her Ghoul instincts, there's no way that during those 18 years she didn't taste her own blood at some point during training or a fight or an accident...' I take a deep breath.
And then I move my tail for Kali to hug. Kali's little hands hold onto my tail without trying to bite. I think she learned her lesson that she can't bite just anything.
"Haa... being a mother is so hard." I lie down, letting Kali stay cuddled up to my tail. She's still crying a little bit, but she's much calmer. In the end, it was just a scare.
Though it's still good to treat her gum so this doesn't become a bigger problem. As soon as Saluvia arrives, I'll make her take care of Kali.
'But Saluvia doesn't like treating anyone who isn't me... she told me herself to avoid asking that as much as possible... Kali's health doesn't influence mine... and it's a small injury... Saluvia might not want to do anything...' I grow pensive.
It's just an injury, but it could get worse if it gets infected or something, so I won't leave Kali without treatment. I'll find a way to make Saluvia help, even if she initially doesn't want to.
...
...
...
"Hmmm..." I head to Evelyn's room. I just finished studying her fluids. Unfortunately, I didn't discover anything very useful, probably because it's an ability of Evelyn's and doesn't have a change that isn't made by Hikishin.
"Evelyn, I'm back. The results weren't quite what I expected. Today I'm going to deliver—" I stop talking when I see Evelyn sitting in a chair in a pose that's strange, to say the least.
"Hmm..." The smell in the room makes me feel weird. It's a good smell, but something feels wrong.
"Evelyn?"
"Oh, Saluvia, I need your help. Could you do me a little favor? It'll be quick! You'd help me, wouldn't you? Esther isn't here, so your help would be a lifesaver!!" Evelyn's voice makes my body shiver a little, and the way she speaks is strange.
"Wh-What do you need?" I keep my composure as she stands up.
"Ah, it's something small. Kali got hurt, and I was so sad and upset. Honestly, I was feeling really bad, and I need you to help me take care of her. I would be so... grateful if you helped me." I clench my hand tightly, taking a deep breath.
'She's using magic on me...'
"You're seducing me with your strange magic. Esther could kill me for that, you know? Please, refrain from this act, which is dangerous to my physical integrity," I say, waving a hand in front of my face, trying to use Hikishin to purify the air I'm breathing.
"Ah, but my daughter is hurt, and I know you wouldn't want to help! Please!! Help me! I'm being serious about being grateful. My daughter is so important. Could you do me this solid just this once? Pretty please with a golden apple on top?" She approaches, grabbing my arm and placing it between her breasts. Her gaze is adorable.
'My brain throbs...' Her magic struggles against some of my defensive spells, causing me a headache.
"A-Are you okay?" she asks as a drop of blood drips from my nose, and I hear a sound like a snap inside my brain.
'She broke my defenses?! That was a high-level mental block spell!!' I pull away from her quickly.
"I-I'll take care of your daughter. Please keep some distance." I don't want Esther to kill me.
"Perfect! Thank you so much! You're incredible!" Evelyn's tone of voice is enchanting, even though I know it's a lie, that it's all just pretense and manipulation from her. Honestly, she doesn't even seem like the same cowardly girl from when the competition for the throne began.
'Damn her...'